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Justin Bond

Justin Bond was born and raised in rural Oklahoma. He may or may not hold the record for the most dropouts from regional, state, and private colleges and universities by any one individual in Oklahoma history. He is an alumnus of the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute at Quartz Mountain, where he studied with the poets Ruth L. Schwartz, Judith Taylor, and Donald Hall. A contributing editor for The Found Poetry Review, Justin currently lives and works in Tulsa, OK.

FromGoing Native

The Drift

Fear will eat your heart raw
like the buzzard picking at the jellied eye
of the possum carcass along the roadside.
It is growing late, but soon the streetlights
will flicker to life one by one, waking moons
to drown out the stars that can't help but look
like bullet holes riddling the darkening shift
of December sky from hem to hem.
The sow will slaughter the weakest suckling in her drift,
the spider will devour generations to survive the winter.
Ask the wild dog how it feels to know
the guns are always pointed at you.
Because they are, and knowing might save you.
Even guardian angels blink.